


Paradox

by ecotone



Category: Destiny (Video Game)
Genre: Character Study, Gen, Vault of Glass, in a way ?, the Vex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-19
Updated: 2016-02-19
Packaged: 2018-05-21 14:17:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 904
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6054685
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ecotone/pseuds/ecotone
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The Vex existed everywhere. Kabr was their starting point.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Paradox

Here, surrounded by roses, Kabr knelt.

Everything seemed to be fitting together, parts of his mind clicking into place just as his armor had. He knew this was his destiny, his cosmic purpose; he wished it wasn’t.

The air tasted like the sea.

Since he'd delved into the Vault, everything had seemed out of sync, like his mind was ahead of his body. Surrounded by his teammates, his friends, he had always felt at home. They were all fighting together under the same banner, after all, a ragtag fireteam seeking thrills in the form of the Vault of Glass.

A miniature army, he thought. One roiling mass of Light and anger, reborn strangers seeking answers in knives and guns, in each other.

The Heart pulsed in front of him, radiating Darkness. Or was it something else? The flowers swayed, almost glowing in the dim light. He was alone here, all traces of the Vex gone. Why were they gone? They had tormented him for hours, days, weeks? Months? Years? Centuries-

Is this what revelation tasted like? The sea?

Somewhere past the heart, he could see what looked like the sun. Whatever it was, it shone out, filling the gardens with light. Maybe the Vex were not always creatures of the Dark, he thought. Worship may have been the option granting them the highest chance of survival. Maybe they were created in the image of the Light, like he was.

The Heart thrummed, and he thought he could almost understand its language.

Shifting, he turned his face to the writhing mass. He stretched out his arms and breathed, tasting the salty air. He’d been to the coast as a child, taken by his parents. He could remember the feeling of the sun shining down on him, of the sand underneath his small feet. He’d gotten sunburn, he remembered.

The pull of the Heart felt like he was being pulled out to sea. It was like being eaten away and replaced by something new. He felt like a wave was washing over him, and what was left was changed, smoother, almost perfected.

It felt like an epiphany. He could feel it in his brain, entheogens swimming in his blood.

The pull of the Darkness made more sense, now. Titans were never swayed by the allure of the Ahamkara, but the Heart felt different, larger, almost cosmic. The Heart gave eternal life, even if the price was kneeling for infinity among the flowers.

Why not conquer if you were omnipotent? The Vex were, surely, and if not they were omnipresent, existing everywhere and at every time at once.

Everywhere but here, he realized. Their end was here, but so was their beginning.

The flowers stretched on forever. They reminded him of his mother’s garden.

Somewhere, the disciples of Osiris watched. Somewhere, Toland walked among the throne worlds of the Ascendant Realm.

Here, in the Gardens, Kabr knelt.

_Now it is done. If I speak again, I am not Kabr._

Somewhere in an infinite loop existed his teammates. They were erased from existence, but the Vex had to keep records somewhere. No matter where they were, though, they were not in this plane of reality. The more he learned, the less seemed to be.

He was Kabr the Legionless now, but his mission was for them.

They were the reason he drank of the Vex, the reason he had made his Light into a shield and left a gash in the heart of the Vault. Their names were gone from his memory, but they lived on in some small way. Their Ghosts were gone now, and so was his.

_No one can open the vault alone. I opened the vault. There was no one with me but I was not alone._

The Vault was a paradox and so was his team. So was he. He was his own destruction.

He was the first Vex.

Somewhere in the dark of the Vault, while he had been fashioning his armor out of bronze and drinking the fluid of the Vex, he'd become like them. His vengeance would be his own downfall; he would create that which sought to destroy him. There was a reason the armor fit so perfectly.

He had loved the sea as a child. Now, the taste of it choked him.

All hope was not lost, he told himself. The Aegis existed, and the Vault was wounded, bleeding time. Somewhere in the future, another team would make it out of the Vault.

He had made his own fate, in some small way. He was stuck in a loop, creating and destroying himself, but the Aegis was an act of rebellion. He hoped that whoever opened the Vault would find his instructions. Maybe the Ghosts of his team would be found. Then, all of them would be put to rest.

Here, there was no chance of eternal rest. The armor was a part of him now, melded into his skin. His joints creaked, limited in their movement. When he opened his mouth, he spoke in no language he’d ever heard.

It was the language of the Heart, the language of the Black Garden. He heard the Heart, and was completely consumed.

Somewhere, decades before, Kabr stepped into the Vault.

01000111 01110101 01100001 01110010 01100100 01101001 01100001 01101110 01110011 00100000 01101101 01100001 01101011 01100101 00100000 01110100 01101000 01100101 01101001 01110010 00100000 01101111 01110111 01101110 00100000 01100110 01100001 01110100 01100101

**Author's Note:**

> why do i like all of the doomed fireteams, you ask? who knows.
> 
> i love the theory that kabr created the vex trying to destroy them; it really fits the whole paradox theme the vex have going. the binary at the end is the 'guardians make their own fate' text from VOG. 
> 
> hmu if there's anything worded weird/misspelled, this was written and changed over a few weeks.
> 
> thanks for reading!!


End file.
